Arch Manning and 2025's other 24 most interesting college football people

New York Times

16 hours ago

What if Arch Manning is just really good? Or anywhere in between 'the clear No. 1 pick in whichever draft he chooses to enter' and 'the bust of busts?'
The Texas redshirt sophomore quarterback enters the 2025 season as college football's most interesting person. Most talked about, most followed, most dissected, most hyped — soon to be most responsible for weekly overreaction, starting with the No. 1 Longhorns' Aug. 30 opener at No. 3 Ohio State.
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He's a 21-year-old member of the first family of football, hoping to emulate his grandfather and uncles in greatness at the sport's most important position. He has the traits. He has the preparation, both in terms of football mentors galore and an upbringing that limited distractions.
He seems to have the personality to handle the circus, which is good because he has a lot of analysts — including The Athletic's Dane Brugler — projecting him as the NFL's top prospect after this season.
That's what the scouts think now, and it's understandable. But a year ago, they were highest on Georgia quarterback Carson Beck, and he's playing for the Miami Hurricanes this season. Some of them viewed Quinn Ewers, who started at Texas the past two seasons while Manning sat, as a first-round talent. Ewers ended up going in the seventh round to the Miami Dolphins.
These people don't play a lot of actual football, and a dozen or so games of it can vastly change how they are viewed by the folks who build professional teams.
There's nothing in Manning's past, including the 95 passes he's thrown as a collegian, that guarantees he'll do the job at a No. 1 overall pick level. Maybe he'll play more like the 20th pick, the third or fourth quarterback in his class, which would still be really good. Maybe Texas will fall short of the expected national title. Maybe Manning will disappoint this season, which would not be difficult to do given the expectations, and come back as a completely different player in 2026.
The only guarantee is that his every move on the field will be as scrutinized as any player this sport has seen. And that some of the people watching and commenting will lack the thing that seems to have Manning in position to grasp this opportunity: perspective.
Here are 24 others of interest in '25, including five others at his position:
These two go together after their little Citrus Bowl kerfuffle last season, and because they have preseason top-15 teams that could potentially hook up in a much more important postseason game after the 2025 season. We're talking big personalities, feather rufflers by nature, building traditional non-powers into College Football Playoff hopefuls. And with potential Heisman/first-round candidate LaNorris Sellers leading South Carolina and quarterback Luke Altmyer and 15 other starters back for Illinois, they have the goods to back up the talk.
They could also share top billing on 'Stepbrothers 2.' Imagine Bielema crashing one of those Beamer Tik-Tok dances and giving him the noogie of all noogies.
Obvious, yes, but undeniable. And here's another reason to be thankful for the start of the season. Belichick's personal affairs can recede and one of the fascinating questions in American sports in 2025 can prevail: What will a 73-year-old legendary NFL coach who has never worked in college football do with a perennially underwhelming college football program?
Beyond the challenges of player procurement and retention that have driven people such as his buddy Nick Saban out of the sport, there are questions of connection and development. Long-ago North Carolina star Lawrence Taylor accelerated the rise of Belichick, who has been around pros for 50 years. Now he's dealing with kids and is expected to equip them to beat teams with more talented kids.
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Less obvious but a key story in the sport, this year and beyond. Less than two years into the job, Cohen is in charge of an inherited coach who, like Brian Kelly at LSU, hasn't delivered on expectations. Lincoln Riley is 15-11 since his 11-3 debut with the Trojans in 2022. He may not be on the hot seat now, but he's in need of a statement season and doesn't necessarily have the team to deliver it. Cohen, meanwhile, has hired a GM for the program and is trying to get it where it should be financially.
USC football has one top-10 finish in the past 13 years, and the school has not had sustained AD/football coach excellence since the days of Mike Garrett and Pete Carroll. Cohen/Riley have the potential to forge a national power, but right now have a Big Ten afterthought.
It's going to take Franklin a long time to pretty up that 1-18 record against top-five teams, but the 125-57 record as a head coach also counts. And matters. And should impress. That includes two College Football Playoff wins last season. The reality for Franklin is that, while he has rebuilt a traditional power into a special program over more than a decade, it's not Ohio State. But Franklin might have the better team in 2025, especially if quarterback Drew Allar takes another step. Does Franklin quiet the haters a year after Ryan Day did the same in Columbus?
Grumors are back, baby! Gruden's years-long image rehab project, after offensive emails got him fired as Raiders coach in 2021, has delivered him to the doorstep of hirable status again. His relationship with the NFL right now is suing the league over those emails, and he just said he'd 'die to coach in the SEC,' so an on-campus opportunity seems most likely for a guy who hasn't been in college football since he coached receivers for Paul Hackett at Pitt in 1991.
Oklahoma? LSU? Arkansas? Tennessee, gratifying the fans who have been most obsessed with him over the years, say after Josh Heupel leaves to take the Oklahoma job? Let's get the speculation cooking.
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He's been one of the most-watched players in the sport since the groundbreaking NIL deal that brought him to Tennessee. His first full season on the field was pretty good, not great, but then he didn't have much great around him either. So whether Iamaleava's camp was complaining more about a pay raise or about offensive roster support after the season, they handled things terribly, and he ended up in a worse situation. Of course, if his loss proves UCLA's gain and he can give a jolt of life to a sluggish program while looking more like the NFL prospect he's supposed to be, Iamaleava will have Vol Twitter reeling.
Unfortunately, some of the intrigue relates to Lagway's preseason injuries, and he's had a few of them dating to the hamstring he pulled last season against Georgia. That's the only game the Gators lost with him as a starter, winning the other six, and there's plausible hope that he can turn the Gators into a Playoff contender and cement Billy Napier as the long-term answer in Gainesville. He's a potentially special player. But he has to play. In less than a month, it's Florida at LSU, at night.
The future is bright for Florida with DJ Lagway under center. The true freshman QB put together an impressive 2024 season and is expected to be one of the top QB's in the nation in 2025! pic.twitter.com/E9HHO4NAk8
— College Football Live (@CollegeFBonX) March 2, 2025
College football is better when there's a running back who bends the imagination and takes a bit of oxygen away from the quarterbacks and receivers who dominate the modern game. Love is that kind of player. It's even more fun when a player like that plays at a place like Boise State and takes a bit of oxygen away from the usual suspects. Love definitely doesn't check that box, and he's not quite as dazzling as last year's must-see runner, Ashton Jeanty. But Notre Dame could use a Heisman winner — receiver Tim Brown was its most recent, in 1987.
Seriously, Mateer made the cut before his recent, strange dip into newsmaking — Venmo transactions labeled as gambling payments that weren't that at all, he said in a statement. We'll see if anything beyond raised eyebrows comes of that. And we'll see if Mateer is the next Washington State transfer quarterback to do big things at a bigger program. Brent Venables and Oklahoma need something in the range of Mateer's 3,139 yards and 29 touchdowns from last season. That should be possible, though we won't set an over/under on his 2025 production.
Cody Campbell is the star in Lubbock, the billionaire and former Texas Tech lineman who has provided the resources for what he told The Athletic's Sam Khan is the most talented team in the Big 12, 'and it's not really even close.' Now it's on McGuire to translate that into a College Football Playoff berth. Anything short of that is a disappointment for the AP preseason No. 23 team and will bring comparisons to some of Texas A&M's recent failures to actualize its 'on paper' greatness. McGuire has had a solid first three seasons, coaching the Red Raiders to 23 wins. Solid won't cut it anymore.
Vanderbilt opponents in 2025 will have a common rallying cry: stop, and shut up, Pavia. The last time Vanderbilt football had a player with the skill and brashness to cause such a stir was … when? We might be going back a century to one of coach Dan McGugin's stars, popping off to newspaper writers on a train ride to play the University of Chicago.
Pavia is out here talking about winning a national championship and declaring Clark Lea's program is 'gonna run Tennessee' in the future. This has to be such unfamiliar fun for Vanderbilt fans. Also, the element of surprise is gone. And the schedule is brutal. But even if Vanderbilt is 0-11 entering the finale at Tennessee, Pavia will believe the Commodores are going to win and will be a must-watch on every snap.
Diego Pavia says Vanderbilt is coming for it all this season 🏆 👀
(via @finebaum) pic.twitter.com/b474tHaOcY
— SEC Network (@SECNetwork) August 7, 2025
It's not like Travis Hunter brought two-way stardom to college football, but he did it at the highest level possible and no doubt inspired others to work toward that kind of impact. Perich, as reported by The Athletic's Scott Dochterman, is college football's best hope in 2025 for that kind of player. He stood out as a freshman safety and returner, and now P.J. Fleck declares it 'isn't a gimmick' that Perich is going to make a difference for Minnesota's offense. If it's more than the occasional wildcat snap or trick play, he will be that program's most talked-about player since Laurence Maroney 20 years ago.
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Fox's 'Big Noon Kickoff' has made a rather uninspired attempt here to close the gap on ESPN's 'College GameDay,' bringing in Portnoy, the founder of Barstool Sports. It's a choice clearly influenced by the popularity of Pat McAfee.
Yes, both say lots of stupid stuff and hold the attention of America's young beer guzzlers and gambling app enthusiasts. But while McAfee is a largely affable pro wrestling heel who does his homework for when it's time to talk ball, Portnoy comes across as mean, self-aggrandizing and preoccupied with insulting Ohio State (he's a Michigan fan). Fox must want more than that. If Portnoy can't deliver, at least 'Big Noon Kickoff' will also get contributions from Barstool's top talent, Dan Katz.
It would be a slap in the face to football to have a list like this and not include at least one giant on each side of the line of scrimmage. Proctor is the offensive lineman to watch in 2025, the starting point for what Alabama hopes is an instant return to the sport's top rung. He is No. 2 on Bruce Feldman's Freaks List, with utterly absurd numbers: 6-feet-7, 366 pounds, a squat of 815, a bench of 535 and a 32-inch vertical leap. Yes, a 366-pound man with a 32-inch vertical leap. That's enough to make concrete tremble.
Rhoades takes over as College Football Playoff selection committee chair, replacing Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel. So get ready to boil in anger on Tuesday nights this fall as Rhoades explains why one team is ranked over another, citing reasoning that contradicts something he said a week earlier in comparing other teams. In all seriousness, it would be great if Rhoades could try to be a bit more forthcoming than Manuel was last year on committee decisions. Mark Dantonio, Damon Evans, Ivan Maisel, Chris Massaro and Wesley Walls also join the selection committee in 2025.
No, this is not to suggest Saban actually wants to get back into coaching. It is to suggest his voice remains highly important in the sport, and hopefully he'll do more embracing of actual solutions for college football's issues and less reminiscing on the way it used to be. Also, Nick? Have some fun. If someone makes a crack about your recruiting tactics at Alabama, roll with it. No one who loves the sport enough to watch 'GameDay' believes any talent factory of the past 50 years did it on room, board, scholarship and family atmosphere alone.
A lot of people in college football would have bet a lot of money a couple of years ago that Sanders wouldn't still be coaching Colorado at this point. But here he is, watching Travis Hunter and son Shedeur Sanders from afar, fighting through cancer and trying to prove this program has substance and staying power. It's hard not to respect that.
If the college football universe were 'Star Wars,' Sankey would be Darth Vader. Yes, he's a villain — especially if you don't want NCAA Tournament expansion — but he wins a lot, he fits into the universe and deep down there's the heart of someone who used to fight for the little guy.
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And at least he's not Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti, who has no background in the mythology and wants to turn the whole thing into 'Spaceballs.' It's time for Sankey to use a Jedi mind trick and talk Petitti out of his College Football Playoff expansion plan of excessive auto bids and play-in games.
Like Petitti, Seeley has a Major League Baseball background and has landed himself a prominent piece of real estate in a sport in chaos. He has very little chance of succeeding with the CSC — charged with policing the marketplace for players — because that would require coaches and boosters to actually embrace guard rails on themselves rather than do whatever it takes to win. It would take a sharp departure from the entire history of the sport, and from human nature.
But until the inevitable acceptance of collective bargaining, we'll hear from Seeley a lot, and he'll probably tick some people off. Sounds interesting enough.
Smith was the most ridiculous freshman receiver college football has seen. Unless it was Williams. They probably could have been drafted out of high school, they would have gone high in the last draft and — depending on the quarterback needs of teams at the top — they could be 1-2 when they're finally eligible in 2027. Could this be the last season of participation for either or both? Either way, Ohio State and Alabama have new quarterbacks who would be wise to target them obsessively.
Portnoy had a hand in the pursuit and flip of Underwood — the No. 1 overall recruit in the Class of 2025 — from LSU, with sources telling The Athletic's Austin Meek that Underwood can earn more than $10 million at Michigan through multi-year NIL agreements. One of the worst passing teams in 2024 should not be that for long, though expectations should obviously be reasonable in 2025. If things progress this season, the Wolverines could be back among national title contenders in 2026.
A defensive lineman to finish? That's fitting, considering a dominant defensive line comes right after quarterback on the list of things college football teams need to win it all. Clemson looks great in both areas, and Woods isn't just any defensive lineman. He came in No. 5 on that Freaks List, managing a 33-inch vertical with his 310-pound body. As difficult as it is to project quarterbacks in the draft entering a college season, players like Woods are easier to peg. He should be a top-10 pick in the spring, after combining with quarterback Cade Klubnik to give the Tigers a shot at the whole thing.
(Illustration: Kelsea Petersen / The Athletic; Wesley Hitt / Getty, Icon Sportswire / Getty, Robin Alam / Getty)
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